Where has Extension gone?

[Modesto Vega]

In Sparx EA v15 we used an Extension connector to link and stereotype to a metaclass. We are trying to modify an MDG created using v15 with v16 and the Extension connector is not available in the context model that appears when trying to draw a relationship by dragging the connector icon between to elements. However, it is available in the toolbox but all attempts to use it result on non-UML compliant error message.

Has anything changed?

[Geert Bellekens]

I'm afraid you'll have to turn off strict connector syntax, and use the toolbox to create the Extension relation.

And of course report it as a bug.

Geert

[Modesto Vega]

Thanks Geert, v16.1 was released today before submitting a bug I probably should the I can reproduce the issue with v16.1, we are using v16.0 (build 1605).

[Geert Bellekens]

Thanks Geert, v16.1 was released today before submitting a bug I probably should the I can reproduce the issue with v16.1, we are using v16.0 (build 1605).

You can submit the bug for 16.0. It's up to Sparx to see if this is still an issue in the latest version;
We (the users) do enough QA as it is.

Geert

[Modesto Vega]

Thank you, Geert; bug reported.

[Modesto Vega]

Thank you, Geert; bug reported.

Reported as a bug and got a reply in less than 24 hours. To paraphrase the reply: it is not a bug, we cannot reproduce it.

Yet, I have no trouble reproducing it with 16.0.1605 64-bit and was not given an indication of whether it was fixed with v16.1 released yesterday.

[SNIP]
We (the users) do enough QA as it is.

We do, and sometimes Sparx support appears to be tasked with batting all balls out of bounds.

[Geert Bellekens]

I can reproduce the issue, on the latest 16.1.1621

The quicklinker gives me
- Substitution
- metaconstraint
- metarelationship
- stereotyped relationship

But no Extension.

I'll report a bug as well.

Geert

[Modesto Vega]

I can reproduce the issue, on the latest 16.1.1621

The quicklinker gives me
- Substitution
- metaconstraint
- metarelationship
- stereotyped relationship

But no Extension.

I'll report a bug as well.

Geert

Thanks Geert, really much appreciated. This is exactly the same behaviour I am seeing in v16.0 (build 1605).

[qwerty]

I wonder what those Sparxians are doing the whole day. Probably feasting upon the license payed by customers in the futile hope to get a better product.

q.

[philchudley]

Bizarrely the following does work in EA v 16.1

Add a Stereotype onto a diagram
Drag the quicklink to an empty space on the diagram and select Metaclass
Extension appears as the first entry in the Quicklink menu
Choose the metaclass and presto all works fine

Go figure

Phil

[Geert Bellekens]

Even weirder:

If I create a brand new .qea model and add a metaclass and a stereotype on a diagram, I get the extension relation in the quicklinker.

Digging a bit further I found that the difference is the fact that existing metaclasses have stereotype metaclass, whereas the new metaclasses have stereotype UML Standard Profile::metaclass

So it's only an issue for existing metaclasses, not for new metaclasses.

Geert

PS. Damn, I did it again, I should really let Sparx do their own QA and support.

[Paolo F Cantoni]

Even weirder:

If I create a brand new .qea model and add a metaclass and a stereotype on a diagram, I get the extension relation in the quicklinker.

Digging a bit further, I found that the difference is the fact that existing metaclasses have stereotype metaclass, whereas the new metaclasses have stereotype UML Standard Profile::metaclass

So it's only an issue for existing metaclasses, not for new metaclasses.

Geert

PS. Damn, I did it again. I should really let Sparx do their own QA and support.

I know the feeling!
However, you needed to get to the bottom of things.  Until you understood why you weren't sure how far the "rot" went.

We've found similar issues.

Thanks for tracking this one down.
Paolo

[Modesto Vega]

Geert and Phil thank you for tracking this down.

In conclusion, it is only a bug if you are updating a profile or MDG put together with a previous version of Sparx EA. If you are starting from scratch with each version is not a bug. Only a sparxian will think that way.

Has Sparx Systems decided to change something so fundamental without providing an upgrade mechanism and making an effort to bringing to the attention of their customers?

[Geert Bellekens]

Has Sparx Systems decided to change something so fundamental without providing an upgrade mechanism and making an effort to bringing to the attention of their customers?

Yeah, par for the course I'm afraid.
"upgrading" is not really difficult though. A 20 line script should suffice to set the fully qualified stereotype. Even an XMI export/import could be enough to solve the problem.
(make sure you don't have a metaclass stereotype in the model stereotype list)

Geert

[Modesto Vega]

"upgrading" is not really difficult though. A 20 line script should suffice to set the fully qualified stereotype. Even an XMI export/import could be enough to solve the problem.
(make sure you don't have a metaclass stereotype in the model stereotype list)

I presume that script that loops through all elements in package will do the "upgrade" job. Not too please about having to find the time for such "upgrade".